


Air and Aptitude

by Hgrade



Series: Sentinel Prime Goes to Hell [2]
Category: Transformers Animated (2007)
Genre: Abortion, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Infidelity, M/M, Mech Preg, Racism, Slut Shaming, Sticky, Suicidal Thoughts, Ultra the Flawed Parental Figure, Unhealthy Relationships, dubcon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-11
Updated: 2016-06-11
Packaged: 2018-06-08 01:13:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6832870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hgrade/pseuds/Hgrade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jazz gets Sentinel sparked up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Air and Aptitude

**Author's Note:**

> Sentinel's a tsunadere bondmate.  
> Warning: This is not exactly a happy story. The main relationship is very unhealthy and the writing is brusque.

Seven cycles, Sentinel's been waiting. The little monitor lets out a soft beep and he downloads the results. The bot double checks the readings from his nodes, nods twice and then touches his left antenna. No reply to the ping, Sentinel sits at his desk. The bot shoves the test into a drawer and forgets about it. The little flutter in his chest happens to be a great reminder of the entire fragging mess. He looks over the results again. Carrier protocols active, spark container expanded within the last few solar cycles to allow the orbiting sparklet more room. It's a great mess, so the mech goes back to filing orders.

Usually when there's an event Sentinel gets to stay by Ultra's side, and it's nothing happy or important tonight. The senate has been packed full, dozens of dreary old clunkers in the seats. Cameras on his blue body, and it only makes Sentinel feel like he's baring his spark to them. The lenses dilate and focus on the Magus's latest legislature, it's boring as bolts. Unimportant, but still the optics on the guardians like a vice. Jazz can tell there's something off about his work buddy. The Magnus hasn't detected anything wrong with his top two guardsmen. Sentinel steels himself and makes it through the night without obeying the protocols begging him to run off stage.

Another deca cycle passes, he can feel the space in his chest increasing. It distends his spark chamber badly, forcing the expansion deeper into his chest. There's no second option when he's hiding the sparkling. Other parts of his chassis feel too tight. Beneath the mesh of his protoform, deep inside his abdomen, the tiny frame is being built. Not too late for him to change his mind, he can quit this carrier deal whenever he wants. The bitlet is his alone, but the way Jazz brightens up when he so much as glances at the bigger bot makes Sentinel grow guilty.

Jazz has some extrasensory spark reaction, or he's thinking about how he might get Sentinel overcharged enough for an encore of that night. It wouldn't be the first time a bot looked at him too kindly for just that reason. Suspicion does say that both parents can feel the presence of their sparkling. Aside from that backwards relic thinking, it's time for Sentinel to slow down. The bitlet's been putting a lot of strain on his body, Magnus certainly noticed that. Offering a high ranking guard time off doesn't look good on anyone's resume but still. He can't take it.

Quitting again, how ironic that he's quit the oil ever since he became sparked. Without the additional stress of overcharge, Sentinel starts to look better. Again he can always get a nice cup or two from the femme in the office across the hall. There's so many bots packed in central it's like a bunch of scraplets on a battlefield. 

Sentinel's debating over getting that cup with the cute femme secretary mid-day when Jazz slips into his office. "Hey there big bot." his smile is wry. "I brought you some medical grade."

The look on Sentinel's faceplate does not flatter, "Why? Are we having our oil changed early this cycle?"

"Nah, your chrome's just looking a little dull." instantly, Sentinel's optics go searching his blades for the blemishes. Jazz smiles apologetically as he puts the cube on his boss's desk. 

"Where?" Jazz holds out a servo, wiggles his fingers. Sentinel sighs heavily before humoring his cohort. The bigger hand drapes itself over Jazz's. 

"Here." the cyber-ninja immediately identifies the scuff, and a little dented on a joint. "Do you think you got a virus?" Jazz gently presses a finger to the spot. A dramatic ventilation comes from his host.

Jazz's expression looks curious as Sentinel straightens in his seat. "I" he pauses for a nanoklik. "I have something to tell you."

"Shoot." the white and black bot tilts his head a little, he's expecting something silly like overworking. Big blue number two has always been a workaholic.

Sentinel removes his hand from prodding radius, and looks to make sure the door has been shut. "Jazz." he clenches the fist at his side slowly. "I-I'm" Sentinel hates the sound of his own voice faltering, "carrying your sparkling." the blue frame shutters, disgusted with himself. Loathing fills his circuitry as he waits for Jazz to react, maybe even give him a violent reply. Sentinel thinks he deserves complete rejection, it's happened before. He wasn't careful, neither of them were.

Instead comes the nervous, and crawling "Come again?"

"You didn't hear me?" Sentinel rises out of his seat, unsure if he should feel anger or grief.

"I did, I just" the smaller bot looks around, as if anticipating some hidden cameraman to hop out of a wall panel and tell him it's a prank. "Are you being serious?"

"Yes."

Joints go weak, hissing at the thought of a sparklet. "Are you sure?" Jazz can't imagine Sentinel being a carrier of a sparkling at all.

"Yes, I have test results." Sentinel grits his teeth, the words come out choppily. "I want to know, if you're interested in it at all." The cyber-ninja looks down at the desk, thinking. Sentinel ponders over those that said bots who've seen war want creations more than anyone. 

Jazz realizes that he's been waiting for this, waiting for someone to give him the chance. Any excuse, he would take to have a bitlet of his own. Maybe it was the loneliness of their empty dojo, maybe it was everything his Master had taught him. 

Jazz goes silent for a cycle, venting quietly before answering "Of course I am."

"You want it?" it, not he, or she. It, not a 'bot.

Jazz looks up at Sentinel. "I want them." he stands tall. "When did we spark it? I mean, it was the party right?"

"That was about five decacycles ago." oh yes, five decacycles ago. Jazz remembers it very clearly, he can't stop the automatic once-over his processor does. _It was the Magnus's spark-date, everyone had gotten overcharged. Rumor had it that Sentinel fragged half the office last steller cycle. Jazz only wanted a polite word with his co-worker. At first, he couldn't stand Sentinel. They've only been at it for a hundred steller cycles, and the animosity has begun to shrink at last. As the cycles wore on, he found himself appreciating the other bot's attitude despite their squabbles. Sentinel could be reasonable, much like when Jazz pressed their faceplates together at the tail end of the party._

The blue bot didn't protest, he stuck his tongue into Jazz's intake with the taste of motor oil on his breath. Both of them were overcharged from all of the mixed fuel offered at the hastily thrown party. Any class that had been there became drained as the evening wore on. Memorizing the kibble on Sentinel's back was easy with both servos, and they had sunk into the table covered with old present wrappings. The touch of bare interface, Ultra had been very surprised but the creepy smile he eventually wore told Jazz all the- "Are you listening to me?"

"Uh, come again blue bot?"

"I said, there's a contributor test out now. It's a little more expensive but if you want me to take it I can order one."

"No worries blue, I'm sure it's mine." he smiles a tiny bit and steps closer. "Do you mind if I try to sense them?"

Internally, the blue bot cringes. Maybe that talk of sparks knowing one another is more than a fever dream, "Go ahead." Sentinel looks down at the spot on his chest as Jazz reaches. 

Gentle touching, the smaller spark pauses in its endless orbit. Inquisitively, the tiny ball of light moves towards the unusual presence. Outside, the warmth becomes almost unbearable. Jazz lays his hand flat against the hidden spark chamber despite the delinquent inferno. "Damn." the seam for Sentinel's spark chamber lights up, blue radiance pooling from it. The cyber-ninja withdraws his hand as if it had been touching a forge. "Did you feel that?" Jazz turns his servo over, observing the slight melt in the plating.

Sentinel's eyeing his chest, "Yes." no warping, metal of stronger temper than Jazz's. It had to of hurt.

"Sorry, did it override your systems?" he reaches and softly takes Sentinel's servo.

The servo squeezes over the faint, melted metal "It's just heat." Sentinel frowns at the coddling hold. "This doesn't make us a couple. I'm not some new-spark that needs their servos held while they drink their mercury." it's defensive, like he's been caught with his panel open for all of Iacon to see.

"I know, I just want to let you know I'll be here for you." he smiles, feeling ever so empty and dead in his spark. Sentinel really knows how to make a 'bot feel special.

"I'm an incubator for your sparklet. If you didn't want it, I'd remove it." 

Jazz's voice makes no indication of how utterly disturbed he is, "That's cold." The gears in the white bot's head are turning, carefully. He doesn't want to think what Sentinel's saying is wrong, or spiteful. Every bit of his spark feels hurt from the remarks. Sentinel has a reputation, a well-known one in the elite guard. Easy bot, very loose with his paneling. The cyber-ninja heard the rumors but this, this had to come with that territory. "I don't want to be rude but have you dabbled? Though, it's not my place to ask." Jazz's adoration blinds him from thinking less of the 'bot, so he imagines it's all his own fault. He feels like an immense hypocrite, the sparklet is Sentinel's. Master taught him all that, but didn't master say that going at it with an oil-slick overcharged bot a bad thing too? "You don't have to answer."

Sentinel scoffs, then smirks "I haven't." he sounds like he just took in some very high class high grade. The white bot wonders why. Then the big bot rubs his chin idly, frown arriving. Sparked bots that don't go with extra trans-fluid intake end up making clones of their frametype. Dabblers are bots that have multiple nanite donors, ones that warp and alter the frame type greatly due to their varied CNA blueprints. 

"Sentinel, if it really makes you uncomfortable you don't have to carry it." despite his mounting misery, Jazz will not make anyone carry a spark that they don't want. Sparklet gestation can be grueling, and unless carefully nourished it can easily extinguish both sparks if care isn't taken. "If it puts you in danger, drop it. I can tell you don't like the idea of carrying."

The blue bot sighs through his vents, "Jazz, listen to me. I've been through this before. You know what happened?" Sentinel very lightly traces a line down a spot to the right of his sparkchamber seam. 

Jazz shudders at the very implication. "You caught them early." Sentinel with a small crowd of clones bubbles up in his processor without any permission.

"Yes." of course he did, he's usually one for plans. A bot of order, the chaos of an unwanted sparkling wouldn't have a place in his world. Unless he made space for it specifically.

It's a lie, a lie to himself and to Sentinel. "It's late right, right." Actually, it's very early. They have time, but Sentinel must want the bitlet. He must want the sparklet almost as much as Jazz wants it. Jazz finds himself comforted by the distorted assumption, and he can't help but listen to the little delusion he's telling himself. The second in line's words are rough, sharp and hurtful though. Something really fragging bad must of happened, and Jazz can't process if he's more angry at Sentinel or himself. The cyber-ninja rubs his antenna and looks into Sentinel's face. "I'll help you. I'll be here no matter what." 

"That means, well" he pauses, what does that mean. That means time off, adjusting his armor to let his protoform swell to accommodate the frame. "yes, I'll keep it. But" Taking in more fuel, announcing the sparkling present. Would Ultra be mad? Sentinel groans. "one thing."

"Yes?" the ninja can feel the additions coming on.

"We never speak of how they were conceived."

"Everything plus, sir." something they can both agree on.

"Frag, Jazz" The ninja replies with a raised optic-brow. "let's pretend we're sparkmates." Jazz turns his head a little to the door as someone passes by. Sentinel speaks quieter. "If I become Magnus, I can't have a bastard creation around." he hiss-whispers to Jazz.

"Oh boss." fate must hate cyber ninjas. The cruel energon bait of a fake bond with a bot he's been crushing on.

"I know, I know. We just have to play the part. Say that after the party we started dating." and Jazz has yet to say no, which is the best part. Sentinel sounds puzzled, as if he's forgotten about the rudimentary components of a romantic partner. He frowns as the thought bubbles up, he did his best to block out those thoughts _after Elita died. Sentinel's a bad partner, he should of died instead of her. Optimus would say that._ "Or even before the party, frag." 

Jazz dislikes the sudden glazed-over gleam in Sentinel's optics, "I thought office-romance was against regulations."

Shaking his head, Sentinel replies "You're cyber-ninja guard, Jazz. I'm Autobot Academy. We're different branches. Also technically, we can do this." the bot's back at his desk and furiously typing at his terminal. There's no time for dwelling on the past, ever! He has a future to secure.

The ninja mulls over the loud typing, "So … you haven't dabbled but uh." he looks up and down Sentinel's frame carefully. "I heard you, you know." he makes a motion with his hand. "Fragged a few bots?"

"Jazz, I'm sparked up. That doesn't mean I can't plug into another bot." Sentinel scoffs dismissively.

"Oh." Jazz takes a seat as well, musing on what his break has become.

A few solars later and Sentinel finally gets his torso expanded, a few adjustments from the medics that allows for his spark chamber to spread. It makes him think of Decepticons, they have to have huge sparks for their giant bodies. The very thought of his own body forcing him to become like those mindless things disgusts the elite.

A deca cycle later and all the paperwork goes through, bots are speaking but nobody seems to care too much. Ultra Magnus has been in office before the war broke out, it's not like he hasn't seen bots carrying and connecting in inappropriate ways.

At some point, the office rumors have become too much for the Magnus to ignore. The paperwork alone was terrifying, so many regulations manipulated. Ultra had to hand it to Sentinel, the bot sure knows how to work the system in ways that twisted and snapped loopholes into abysses. Those reasons, among others find Sentinel being called in early one fine solar. "Sentinel Prime, at ease."

Tall, proud, a bot with the extremely exaggerated shoulders of a protector-class frame. Sentinel drops his salute and relaxes his stance. Ultra eyes the too-forward position of Sentinel's grill and plate, dark mesh distended with the unmistakable presence of a forming proto-frame. "Explain to me" he offers a datapad.

Sentinel's optics narrow as he reads it, "Sir I ... I never thought I would be capable of sparking with another again." his intake turns down. "Otherwise I would have been equipped with a contraceptive chip when I interface with my sp-" 

It was Ultra's fault of course, he should of been stronger. He should not put Sentinel or Jazz in that situation, or any bot. "Either way, Sentinel Prime. I think it is best for all of us if you carried the sparklet til it's due date. We are always in need of more good bots." The bigger bot's expression lightens "If you don't want to keep them, you can always give it to someone who wants a sparkling." 

Sentinel sighs through his audial. Then he feels complete, devastating humiliation snap up his hydraulics. Ultra has seen right through their ruse. His face burns with energon, and he stifles back the lubricant that wants to drip down his faceplate. Ultra had been an orphaned, weak spark, taken in by two bots willing to deal with a runt, devastated spark like his. Orphaned sparks are like parasites, forever longing for their missing creator. Utra's spark would have been a ravenous little monster, spending time in both parent's spark chambers to absorb their strength. Perhaps it had been what they wanted, or maybe they gave too much to him. The spark had turned it's offered protoform into the monstrous frame so well known today, and done so many wonderful things "Y-You suggested taking to Jazz."

"Correct."

"I already have, sir." his voice cracks. "Jazz wants the bitlet, sir." Sentinel reaches up and rubs at his optics. Weak, he's weak and pathetic. "It's why I'm keeping it." it's just the excess additives and the second spark altering his processing.

"Oh, well I understand this more then." the Magnus pauses and can't school his expression anymore. He really didn't mean to make his underling cry at all. He side steps awkwardly before making it to Sentinel. "Prime." the sniffling bot looks up, eyes glittering and casting their glow erratically from the fluid. "I know, it's difficult to lose someone you love. To break away from bots, and well. Do what you do." Sentinel's vocalizer cracks and blips, feeling the chasm of despair open beneath his emotionally frazzled circuits. "It's okay, I just want you to do your best for this bot." he reaches, but does not touch Sentinel's chest. "Their very spark is in your servos. You need to be strong." Sentinel wheezes and grabs onto his superior for support. Frag, he should of sent Sentinel and Optimus to therapy after all. "You're going to be a caretaker." the Magnus makes a note to arrange for something later.

"I know I will. " and Sentinel has never hated the Magnus so much. He finds himself praying that Unicron will eat Cybertron just to offline the fragger.

A deca-cycle later and Sentinel has taken some advice to spark. "We're gonna be creators." Jazz says, stepping into Sentinel's apartment. Disbelief hits the cyber-ninja, it's a sparse little pad. The furniture still smells new, Sentinel has kept the place too clean. 

With little surprise, Jazz hasn't found any dusty furniture or flora. They're almost half done with packing, "I feel like I can still sense our bond." Sentinel sips at a memory, peering at some old datapads.

"They say bots you bond with will stay with you forever, ya dig."

"Yeah, that's true." they sit down, quietly in the dark.

"You need Energon?"

"No, I'm good." the furniture folds up into neat cubes, and soon the work runs dry.

Sentinel lays down on the last couch standing, Jazz sits on the floor. "That got done quick." he leans his head back and Sentinel touches his kibble delicately.

"I have time off accumulated for the last, oh few million years." grinning, "I could always take some of it to set up our new dig." the black and white bot has no idea that Sentinel was persuaded by Ultra. It's like grinding salt into an open wound.

A groan, "Yes, you should do that." as much as he detests the thought of interfacing with a mech, his carrier controlled circuits are suggesting the opposite. The reaction stems from touching the mech's kibble, tracing over the edge of a long plane. "Hey Jazz." he can feel his pelvic plates heating from the vocals alone. First his superiors betray him, now his faulty protocols are doing it too.

The bot looks up from the pushed up panel in his forearm, "Yes?" the touch on his frame ghostly, strange. He's never found Sentinel to be so intimate. Something in his spark stirs, a memory of a dream. It's almost right, here alone with the blue bot. Comfortable silence as they turn to one another.

It feels right, so, so right to Jazz. Their intakes meet, tongues tangle together as the white bot rises and crawls atop Sentinel. Part of him feels guilty for being here, he'd felt the inevitable fall approaching. His servo touches the edge of Sentinel's grill and the other slips between the bot's thighs. Heat, sticky and wet against his fingers. There's digits curling against his side, touching higher and higher. The underside of his cab is shockingly sensitive. Sentinel's fingers are good at finding seams. Tangy, the smell hits his filtration system and goes right to Jazz's head. 

Jazz settles between the bigger bot's legs, crouching and working another finger into the offered, bare interface. The blue bot's optics are offline, "So do you want me to frag you?" Sentinel moans and bites his lip as Jazz slides in a third finger. His fingers are smaller than Sentinel's, two of his would be as wide as one of the blue bot's. It makes his plating burn even hotter, he'd never imagined that they'd be fragging at all.

The lack of pressure irritates Sentinel, his temper has gotten worse over the solar cycles. The rings of nodes press down tightly over the fingers, greedily leaking lubricant over pale fingers. "Harder." it comes out horse and needy. Hips roll against the servo and Jazz squeezes in his pinkie, Sentinel shivers from antenna to pede. Opening his cord casing was automatic, "Do what you want." it takes no further request. The hand disappears. Emptiness slaps him like an insult, but the heat radiating off of the tangle of Jazz's blue-red bundle makes up for it. 

Sentinel was made for a bigger bot, Jazz feels it in the space he can't quite fill all the way. The tight, heated walls erases the distance, and he begin a slow pace. The bigger bot shudders and clings to the sofa, fingers working tightly against the soft metal mesh. There's not enough lubricant, so Jazz pistons in slow, shallow. The thin, white fingers squeeze at the little nub set between them. 

Everything moves fast, the pressure against the tight bundle of nodes make Sentinel's hip jerk up dangerously hard. Jazz nearly slides out, but he rises and angles his hips down to stay inside. The tip of Sentinel's rapidly forming cord presses against Jazz's belly and the smaller bot works out how to press his thumb against the node and wrap his hand around Sentinel's rod at the same time. It seems like a good idea.

Howling, screaming, the bigger bot nearly knocks Jazz over. The pressure on so much of his array makes for several hasty overloads. Warning messages litter his console and he doesn't have the time to clear them one by one so he ignores them instead. Every cord quivers and writhes as Jazz strokes over the overlapping metal plates covering the organ. Lubricant weeps from the tip as Jazz presses over the tip hastily. It almost hurts, nearly hurts because he's already overloaded thrice when Jazz finally starts to frag him deeper. Jazz gets in deep, deep. Sentinel feels like the tip might even be touching his chamber, or maybe the back of his throat. Every inch of his interface array feels like it's been heated past boiling. Sentinel overloads a few more times before he slips into recharge.

It didn't mean anything. No part of Jazz reminded Sentinel of Elita. There's no reason he should be feeling anything more than animosity after letting the half circuit idiot finish inside of his valve. The sensation of transfluid suddenly becomes wet, cold, alien and wrong. Sentinel shivers, sitting up on the otherwise vacant sofa. Wait, it's also covered in puddles of transfluid and lubricant. His thighs are chilly and gunky. Nanites are crawling up his valve and into the waiting protoform. They're adding to the mass and making it less sentinel and more Jazz. "I need some high-grade." he rumbles and rises.

Jazz steps out of the prep block, "No you don’t."

Bewilderment, Sentinel forgot the crank-shaft might stick around. "Right." he rubs his faceplate. The other bot comes around with a cube of medical grade, shiny and metallic. "Sorry. I haven't had any high grade since I got the results." wry smile, "I get the urge to have more, now 'n then." fingers touch the edges of the cube gently. "I don't though." he hasn't even recalled that they're living together.

"I know." Jazz sits on the far, clean side of the couch. "You okay?"

Sentinel drains the cube, the taste of tin is heady and familiar. "Yeah."

With his shoulders down and his optics captivated by the table, Sentinel doesn't look fine. Jazz touches one shoulder tread, speaking quietly "Did I hurt you?"

The bot's intake goes completely silent. "No, you didn't." he sets the cube on the table. "I'm not used to interfacing like that." he closes his mouth tightly, "That's all." as if it would stop him from giving Jazz any more answers. 

Jazz hears him though, loud and clear.

A hundred and twenty eight stellar cycles pass. Jazz hasn't met their lunch date. It wasn't a date, no date dates. Sentinel would never admit that the smooth talking bot has really grown on him. The part of him that wanted to crush all of Jazz's hopes and dreams was calming down too, ugly jealous scraplet that it is. Sentinel has been stuck to office duty with his impending emergence date.

Dates shouldn't happen in offices, Sentinel muses over his empty cubes as he finishes filing a few things. Longarm had a meeting with Intelligence earlier this deca-cycle. He wonders why the bot had plateaued so young, but blames it on the workload. Maybe Magnus should of held that one back. Sentinel's idly trading barbs with the Intelligence Office's Secretary when Jazz drags himself in.

The tense, stiff walk makes Sentinel's hackles raise. "Boss?"

"Jazz." he leans into his seat and observes the bot before him. "What's wrong?"

"Sir … Optimus Prime's crew is missing."

"That slaghead's still around?" Sentinel sighs, "You know, I don't really believe they found the all-spark."

"They did." Jazz crosses his arms over his chest. "Megatron, and several other Decepticons were on their trail. The Elite Guard went in afterwards" the frown bubbles onto his faceplate. "there's no sign of Omega Supreme. Some wreckage at the space bridge and heavy damage kept it from working." 

Seninel's brow furrows. "He's gone." the measure of relief is unimaginable. The pain comes afterwards, in his spark. "Was that all?"

"Magnus wants you to give the eulogy. He said you two were tight." the white bot can't be read.

Sentinel thinks Jazz is jealous, but he can't tell. "I'll see what I can scrape up, Optimus was a good bot." the words are forced. "He was flawed, yes but" it still hurts after all these cycles, the loss feels fresh. "I'm sorry, can you leave?" He rubs his temple. "You're probably busy, you skipped intake."

"I did, we're cleaning things up. Don't worry, I won't stay out tonight."

"Take care Jazz."

"I will."

Jazz can tell there's something unresolved, even at the eulogy. He never asks though, having been briefed on it long ago. 

To Sentinel, it feels like only a solar passes between Optimus being offlined and Optimus found again. More importantly the Allspark was within their reach. Only to be foiled by Optimus's great successes. Sentinel just wants a chance to prove himself. He can't do it when he's been pinned down by lowly office-work. He begins to hate Jazz again. Magnus asked very carefully for the ninja to join their field operations once more.

Sentinel does a good job training the splitspark idiots, only to have them depart to Earth as well. Despite his hatred for organics, Sentinel could deal with them if the fate of Cybertron rested upon him. He does not miss the two Jetstorms, not one bit. No part of his spark wants to care and coddle them. Stupid protocols.

Not even fifth of a vorn has passed when Jazz gets a call on Earth, directly to the comm. Bulkhead looks away from the screen, "Uh, boss. This number's not one I know. Should I answer it?"

Optimus receives the line's code, and groans. "Great."

Bumblebee slides in, looking up at one of the screens "Who is it?"

Jazz sighs, and answers it before anyone can stop him "Hello?"

The screen resolves into a very angry Sentinel Prime. "I HATE YOU." His finger presses against the screen.

The ninja sighs, "Oh, sweetspark." Bumblebee looks from the screen, to the cool guy with a very shocked expression.

"YOU LEFT ME HERE TO DO PAPERWORK. YOU TOOK SAFEGUARD, AND I'M GOING TO MURDER YOU." 

"Uh, Sentinel? Buddy, are you okay?" the yellow bot asks but Jazz starts to wave at him frantically.

"OUR FRAGGING PROTOFORM IS EMERGING AND YOU AREN'T HERE." screaming, punctuated by louder screaming. "YOU. PROMISED ME. YOU'RE A FRAGGING IDIOT. I'M GOING TO TAKE THIS PROTOFORM AND SHOVE IT UP YOUR EXHAUST PIPE."

"Sentinel, I'm sorry. I want to be there."

"I HATE YOU. GO FRAG YOURSELF." the line goes dead. At least it had been an encrypted one.

The silence weighs heavy on Jazz, he rubs his temples in slow circles. 

"Oh man, how do you even deal with a bot like that?" Bee.

"Sentinel's going to be alright?" comes Optimus.

"Congratulations on being a creator!" chimes in Bulkhead.

"I don't know. Thanks man, though. I think he'll be okay. Sentinel's a strong bot."

 

About a megacycle before, Sentinel was beginning to feel the pings in his spark chamber. The second spark had finally reached the perfect size for a standard spark container. He had calmly contacted one of the head medics in the wing he had been booked for. 

Waiting was pretty terrible, he can't put his finger on why but he gets a very bad feeling. He pings around, letting several of their coworkers know they'll have to pick up his workload for a few cycles. Strangely, the Magnus doesn't reply at all. A frown settles on Sentinel's faceplate as the pressure becomes searing pain. He'll have to worry about Ultra's opinion after the protoform arrives.

**Author's Note:**

> [More notes here.](https://updatebar.tumblr.com/post/145765003167/)


End file.
